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Interview: ‘Green Lantern’ Voice Actor Josh Keaton on Being Hal Jordan and Hanging With the Transformers

Two of voice actor Josh Keaton’s main roles correct now couldn’t be any a lot more diverse from a single one more: on the 1 hand, you have room cop and pilot Hal Jordan above in Green Lantern: The Animated Series, and on the other, you have his typical role as Jack, the teenage sidekick to the Earthbound Autobots in Transformers: Prime. But in a recent e-mail interview with Keaton, the actor told MTV Geek what made these two characters tick, how one particular of them shared a great deal of similarities with a certain wall-crawler Keaton has voiced from time to time, and even teased a new video game project with Activision (please tell us they’ve located a way to make a sequel to Maximum Carnage!).

MTV Geek: With a season of Green Lantern beneath your belt, how do you really feel like your handling of the part of Hal Jordan has altered or evolved?

Josh Keaton: Well considering that I’ve started out I’ve had the advantage of brushing up on my GL lore through some comic book studying as properly as a season’s worth of GL: TAS scripts to see how he reacts to a ton of conditions. This story information has undoubtedly aided me realize Hal much better as he’s extremely different from me so I wasn’t able to pull a lot out of my private experience. I grew up nerdy, scrawny, enjoying video video games, and getting picked on. Hal would have been the dude that intervened when I was obtaining hassled in the locker area.That “guy’s-man” self assuredness, his game with the women, as properly as the sheer squareness of the dude’s jaw had been all issues I needed to make certain my portrayal put forth. On that last note, the placement of my voice in that much more adult place is significantly less difficult for me now following a number of years of pretty much residing in a teen mind/voice it was more tough than I would have thought. I’ve also started talking like Hal all the time because I feel I sound a great deal cooler.

Geek: When was the moment when the character clicked for you?

Keaton: Reading “Secret Origin.” The insight into his family lifestyle is exactly where I connected to Hal’s motivations and was ready to make them actual in my very own head. The image of Hal exhibiting up to enlist on his 18th birthday in his dad’s flight jacket even at the danger of disownment is burned into my brain and is the core of my Hal portrayal. This guy will do what he thinks is the right issue to do. Regardless of the final result or the sacrifice.

Geek: A full 180 away from Hal is your function as Jack on Transformers Prime: how does he contrast with your other regular gig in terms of characterization and locating the right voice/personality for him?

Keaton: Jack is equivalent to Peter Parker in that he has a single parent figure, a teenage life with its issues and problems, and is all of a sudden thrust into extraordinary circumstances. The variation with Jack is that he has no superpowers. His very first reaction? Keep the hell away from the items that will (may well) kill you. Self-preservation and wishing for a return to blissful ignorance would be the ultimate target. Extraordinary occasions, however can trigger people to do extraordinary factors and in this scenario, the cynic rises to the event. I patterned his portrayal right after how I, myself would react in this predicament. Well, how I hope I would react. As for the voice? It’s pretty much how I sounded in substantial school.

Geek: Has operating in CG allowed you any much more flexibility in terms of your performance? It is naturally a little less difficult to appropriate in the edit than traditional animation.

Keaton: I have not actually observed significantly of a big difference, but that’s due to the fact we record the dialogue ahead of any of the animation happens. For the actors it is fairly considerably the exact same method.

Geek: Possessing played superheroes in the past, was it all simpler or hard to discover his voice? Along the exact same lines, is there any type of character you have a especially affinity for?

Keaton: Jack variety of is a superhero, just without powers. He offers with alienation from a “regular” daily life and tricks that govern his existence which he’s not at liberty to share with anybody. But the courage he must have in order face these new issues and live as a “squishy” amongst bots, some of which are making an attempt to fairly considerably destroy humankind – that’s quite superhuman if you ask me. I suppose I like playing superheroes because I enjoy exploring what they are like behind the mask, and not simply what they’re about when they are kicking ass.

Geek: When approaching these characters, what do you draw far more from in terms of reference: the design, the script, personalized knowledge?

Keaton: Yes, yes, and yes! Character patterns are important but not often required. There’s obviously an instinct that kicks in when you appear at a sketch of a character – I can speedily picture what he sounds like to me, much in the very same way I have a “voice in my head when I study the comics.” The style isn’t always vital, even so it’s truly just a jump-off point. The script and character descriptions are normally more helpful in creating a character they give you the insights that the writers have into the character, story context, sometimes their historical past. And of course personalized expertise. My instincts will constantly be dictated by my personal experience, but they don’t always assist me when I am enjoying a character that’s markedly various from myself since my instincts are not necessarily their instincts. That’s why I am always viewing folks (non-creepily of program) – everybody I come across in lifestyle IS a character and for these roles that I come across that are nothing at all like me they give me a wealth of stuff to pull from.

Geek: You are a regular go-to guy for Activision when it comes to their Spider-Guy video games (following his part in the Breathtaking Spider-Guy animated series, he’s played Peter/Spidey in several games featuring the character). What varieties of conversations do you have in the booth do you and the VO directors have about capturing the character? Or at this point, do they type of give you totally free reign?

Keaton: I guess it really is type of free reign (result in That is not a contradiction). Naturally I am bound by the dialogue and the total arc of the story so most discussions and path changes would consider location if I necessary a lot more context on a scene or exactly where it is in the story, but in terms of actual scene overall performance, they allow me do my factor and take it from there if something requirements to be altered.

Geek: What else do you have coming up?

Keaton: A couple of rather large video game projects but I’ve signed my life away and can’t disclose significantly else about them. I am also going to be guest starring on an episode of Scooby Doo, (I cannot start to inform you how amazing that is), I am back out auditioning for on-digital camera roles, and I was just interviewed for a new documentary John DiMaggio is creating referred to as I know That Voice!

You can catch a new episode of Green Lantern tomorrow morning when it airs on Cartoon Network, and Transformers Prime airs regularly on the Hub.

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